BOULDER — Before the No. 24 Colorado Buffaloes took on the Northern Iowa Panthers at the CU Events Center Tuesday night, Buffs head coach Tad Boyle laid out the defensive gameplan.
The most important point Boyle tried to make was that Colorado had to take away Northern Iowa’s 3-point attempts. The next most important point was to take away offensive rebounds.
Those were the keys to victory.
Then, in the first six-and-a-half minutes of the game, Panthers forward Austin Phyfe pulled in four offensive rebounds.
“That’s hard to do,” Boyle said after the game. “That might be an NCAA record.”
Then, after Trae Berhow made his second 3-pointer, Boyle told his team not to let him catch the ball at the 3-point line anymore. He could cut backdoor and try for an easy layup if he wanted, but the Buffs weren’t to let him catch a pass at the 3-point line.
Berhow finished the night 5-of-6 from three.
“He’s got a high release, he’s got a quick release, we know that, we talked about that,” Boyle said. “But we were letting him catch the ball where he wanted to catch it.”
Boyle was worried the attention to detail may slip against Northern Iowa. All week, Boyle called Tuesday night’s contest the “biggest trap game of the year,” and the team had been cutting more and more corners over the past few games.
Against the Panthers, virtually all attention to detail disappeared.
“Fifteen offensive rebounds and 14 made threes, and those are the two keys to your defensive game plan? Boy, that’s the attention to detail I’m talking about,” Boyle said.
The next test came with four minutes to go in the first half. Colorado held a 30-25 lead at the final media timeout before the break and Tad Boyle’s message was clear: This is a chance to build on the lead and take control of the game heading into halftime.
“But it went the other way, and they took the lead,” Boyle said after the game. “That four-minute stretch really hurt us and then obviously coming out of halftime. Our guys weren’t ready to play. They score nine points and (we call a) timeout.”
All of a sudden, the five-point lead is a nine-point deficit.
These blown details—the inability to win the beginnings and ends of halves, the inability to execute the gameplan, and the inability to execute in-game adjustments—have come and gone throughout the season. But one massive missed detail has been a problem in virtually every game.
And it’s what doomed the Buffs on Tuesday.
In a tie game with just under a minute to go, Buffs point guard McKinley Wright IV brought the ball up the court.
“We had a set call and they double-teamed me off the ball screen,” Wright explained after the game. “I was trying to hit the short roller and their backside came up to help and jumped the pass. I should’ve just kept it and called a timeout. I made a mistake, made the wrong read.”
Boyle said he should have seen what was happening and called a timeout from the sideline.
Northern Iowa took the ball down the court and scored an easy layup to take a 78-76 lead. Then, on the next possession, Colorado ran the clock all the way down to 28 seconds before taking a shot, rather than going for a two-for-one.
The little mistakes added up and this run of mistakes began, as they often have this season, with a turnover.
“They gotta take it upon themselves to have a little bit more pride in taking care of the ball,” Boyle said. “Not making home runs plays, just make simple plays. That’s all you have to do; the game is simple and we make it hard.”
These same mistakes have plagued Colorado for much of this season but up until this weekend, Colorado has snuck away with wins despite its flaws. Now, after back-to-back losses dropped the Buffs to 7-2, the sense of urgency has to increase.
“It’s really not a complicated issue,” Boyle said. “It’s a little bit more challenging to fix it. I’m gonna keep trying the best I can to help these guys make simple plays. Watching film is the best way I know how.”
This Colorado team is one of the most talented to ever call the CU Events Center home, but so far this season playing good, clean basketball has been a struggle.
“We don’t have good enough players to do things on our own,” Boyle said. “We have to play together on offense and trust each other and trust the system. Right now, we don’t do either.”
